Meet Marketing Goals During a Hiring Freeze

Resource challenges are common within any business, but add in key points throughout the year (year end, budget season, mid year), and you can find that your dream of a new or promised headcount disappears. To say this is frustrating is an understatement - you’ve been asked to deliver a strategic market plan with an agreed direction, but it's contingent on two things: Budget and headcount. The likelihood is that both of these will be stretched at some point during the year, but it’s the headcount that becomes a problem in future years too, as it’s a direct impact on EBITDA. 

So how do you still meet targets during a hiring freeze?

The great news for marketing leaders (and something which is usually overlooked) is that you have total control of how your budget is spent. This isn’t down to sales, finance or HR, it’s split and allocated based on where the CMO or director believes there’s the biggest need. This should be split into areas that will drive the most leads and return…which will keep sales and finance happy. This means that you’ve got the opportunity to prove the value of headcount by utilising fractional support such as consultants, freelancers, or agencies.

Getting the most from fractional support

“Fractional” is a term that has become popular within the last few years, and it’s essentially about bringing someone in for a short period (fraction) of time to do a specific job. Five years ago you’d have probably called these people contractors, but that’s not as fancy. Nowadays you have all levels of fractional support from CMOs to marketing assistants, you simply tell them how many days you need them to work, or which project to complete, and set them on their way.

For some, the problem with this is that the business and in-house team is so busy fighting fires that there’s not much time to help embed the new person in. At the higher level roles this shouldn’t be too much of an issue, as they should be adept at finding work and asking the right questions, but at a lower level you might find the work a little lacklustre if you haven't got the time to manage the brief. This can be the same with freelance work: If you’re not really clear on what you want to be delivered, and you don’t find someone with the right expertise or experience, you could end up disappointed and wondering where else you could have spent the budget. 

Most businesses will have some form of agency onboard to support an element of their marketing, whether it’s SEO, operations, or PR…but justifying why you want to spend more money with them can sometimes be troublesome. For some unknown reason, finance teams deem it to be a red flag if there's a huge chunk of budget going on one budget line. You’ll also find that depending on the agency, it’s sometimes quicker to do the work yourself once you’ve briefed it in, had an exploratory call, and waited for them to fit the work into their sprints. Fractional support in this sense is quicker and more direct. You’re not dealing with different layers of people, you’re buying someone’s time for a short and snappy piece of work. You just have to find the right person.

So, how do you find the right fractional marketing support?

The ideal for any marketing leader is that they can find the right person quickly and without having to interview different people. They create a brief, or explain it once to someone who “gets it”, and the next thing they know is they’ve got the right support and expertise, at the right rate. When this individual is in the business they’re not worried about managing the person, only that the work is completed. And if there are multiple fractional people, they’re not spending their time trying to get them to talk to each other or work as a combined team. This is only possible when there’s good account management involved and, let’s be honest, that’s unlikely to come from the in-house team who are still fighting those fires. This is where Attributed Marketing supports. We’re a marketing ops and growth agency which means we’ll find out why growth is difficult for you (spoiler, it will be down to data, technology, processes, or people*) and then we’ll help you fix it. We find that most companies have the tools they need to grow, but they’re not using them properly. Having the right people show you how to use them, and the benefit of adding knowledge to the business, will bring in the growth you’re looking for and build a case for further investment or headcount. Imagine getting to the end of the year having increased your marketing results without any extra headcount or budget - we can make that a reality. 

*This doesn’t have to be the in-house marketers, it could be a poor structure or lack of collaboration with the wider business. 

If you’re planning your budget or simply want to figure out if we’re a fit, get in touch and tell us what’s stopping your growth.